Stock Market & Financial Investment News

SEMI predicts 21% increase in production equipment purchases in 2014, WSJ saysThe trade group, SEMI, said suppliers of machines for manufacturing semiconductors can expect two years of solid growth, reports the Wall Street Journal. SEMI predicted the purchases of production equipment will grow 21% to $38.4B in 2014 and 11% to $42.6B in 2015. The group said five new chip factories are likely to be built this year with eight to nine expected to be built in 2015. Publicly traded companies in the space include AMD (AMD), Intel (INTC), Marvell (MRVL), Microchip Technology (MCHP), Micron (MU), NVIDIA (NVDA), Qualcomm (QCOM) and Texas Instruments (TXN).

Qualcomm July weekly volatility elevated into Q3 and report of possible breakupQualcomm July weekly call option implied volatility is at 60, August is at 27, September is at 23; compared to its 52-week range of 12 to 48, suggesting large near term price movement into the expected release of Q3 results on July 22 and WSJ report of possible breakup.

Micron calls Tsinghua takeover offer unrealistic, Reuters reportsMicron has told Tsinghua Unigroup that its $23B takeover offer is unrealistic due to U.S. national security concerns, reports Reuters, citing people familiar with the matter. Sources said Micron believes the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, a government task force which Reuters notes has the power to stop mergers that threaten national security, would not approve Tsinghua's proposed deal. Micron has not formally hired an investment bank because it is not seriously considering Tsinghua's offer, the sources added. Reference Link